Strategic Empathy the Afghanistan Intervention Shows Why the U.S

New America Foundation

Strategic Empathy The Afghanistan intervention shows why the U.S. must empathize with its adversaries.

Matt Waldman, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University April 2014

As the United States withdraws from Afghanistan, it leaves mistakes were made. To name but a few, the U.S. backed violence and uncertainty in its wake. The election of a new power-holders widely seen by Afghans as abusive and Afghan president gives some grounds for optimism and unjust, which undermined the Afghan government’s could improve the fraught relationship between legitimacy and generated powerful grievances; coalition Afghanistan and the U.S. But no Afghan election since the forces caused too many civilian casualties; aid was often 2001 intervention has brought about a diminution in wasteful or ineffective, and swung from being insufficient, violence – and the conflict shows no signs of abating. The in the early 2000s, to excessive, thereby fueling corruption; Taliban is powerful, tenacious and increasingly deadly. and there was no effective U.S. political strategy for Civilian casualties are rising and the fighting forces some Afghanistan or the region.* 10,000 Afghans from their homes every month.1 The linchpin of the U.S. exit strategy, Afghan national security But the most egregious error of the United States was to forces, have critical capability gaps and are suffering huge pursue a strategy founded on a misreading of its enemy. As losses of up to 400 a month due to escalating insurgent former Defense Secretary Robert Gates acknowledges, the attacks.2 The Afghan government is corrupt and anemic, United States was “profoundly ignorant about our reconstruction is faltering and the region continues to be adversaries and about the situation on the ground…. our unstable. knowledge and our intelligence were woefully inadequate.”5 It was assumed the Taliban posed such a threat to the West Over the past twelve years, the United States has spent that it had to be defeated. This was mistaken on two counts: $650 billion dollars in Afghanistan and lost over 2,000 the threat posed by the Taliban was minimal and their lives.3 Close to 20,000 U.S. service members have been defeat was improbable. During the 2000s, from an wounded.4 Democratic institutions have been established operational standpoint, U.S. knowledge of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and there has been progress in human improved. In fact, officials were deluged with information rights, infrastructure and services, such as health and education. But how did such vast and sustained * Matt Waldman is a Research Fellow in the Belfer Center investments not deliver a more favorable outcome? for Science and International Affairs at Harvard’s Kennedy Conditions were undoubtedly challenging, but most School of Government and an Associate Fellow at Chatham observers – and indeed U.S. officials – agree that major House (the Royal Institute of International Affairs).

about what insurgents were doing; they knew less about outside Afghanistan, nor is there evidence that it seeks to who they really were. In essence, most U.S. officials were do so. Conversely, there are few Afghans in al Qaida’s unable to “get inside their minds.” leadership, which is based in Pakistan; in fact, there are as many German nationals on the UN’s al Qaida sanctions list What was missing in U.S. policy-making was empathy: as there are Afghans.8 For years, senior U.S. officials have imagining or simulating another’s experience and said there are fewer than 100 al Qaida operatives in perspective, in order to better understand them. Empathy, Afghanistan and they pose no real threat.9 More in this sense, is rational and cognitive. Is a tool for importantly, Taliban leaders understand what provoked the understanding the way another person thinks, feels or U.S. intervention in 2001, that forced them from power, perceives. It enables us to comprehend another’s mindset, and they have repeated both publicly and privately that they driving emotions or outlook, without requiring us to share will not allow other groups to use Afghan soil to launch the other’s thoughts, feelings and perceptions, or, indeed, attacks against other countries. Most Taliban leaders want approve of them. An empathic approach involves the safety, recognition and influence – and know that any assimilation of diverse information, including social, relationship with al Qaida would threaten that. historical and psychological details, and a conscious effort to see the world through that person’s eyes. Thus, it serves the first demand of strategy: know your enemy. Crucially, An empathic approach involves the empathy can help leaders anticipate how enemies and assimilation of diverse information, including perceived allies are likely to act and react, and help avoid strategic errors. As the theorist Robert Jervis has said: “The social, historical, and psychological details, ability to see the world and oneself as others do is never and a conscious effort to see the world easy and failures of empathy explain a number of foreign policy disasters."6 Indeed, the intervention in Afghanistan through that person’s eyes. Thus, it serves the was marked by an absence of this kind of understanding, first demand of strategy: know your enemy. especially as regards the Taliban and Pakistan’s military, which are considered below. Paradoxically, towards the end of the 2000s, U.S. officials Misjudging the enemy mistakenly believed the vast majority of Taliban foot- soldiers were fighting for money, which led to coalition Given the Taliban’s role in sheltering al Qaida prior to 9/11, “reintegration” efforts to lure them away from the it is hardly surprising that many U.S. officials saw the insurgency through employment and educational Taliban as a threat – but it was a mistake to conflate the two incentives. Unsurprisingly, these efforts made little groups. The Taliban did not invite Osama bin Laden to discernable impact on the strength of the Taliban. Afghanistan, and its relationship with the terrorist group Thousands of Talibs have been killed or injured since 2001, was strained, influenced by Pakistan and highly dependent and while securing a source of income is a factor in on personal relations between the group’s respective explaining their motivations, it cannot explain why so many leaders. Today, there are undoubtedly extremists within the were willing to risk their lives. Taliban, which is comprised of various networks and sub- groups, but links to al Qaida are limited and borne out of In reality, the Taliban cannot be simply categorized as expediency.7 The Taliban does not subscribe to al Qaida’s either fanatical or mercenary. The movement encompasses global jihadi ideology. It has never conducted an attack a wide range of individuals, with multiple and varying

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motivations, who have coalesced around core notions of nothing is more likely to rouse men to fight than perceived what they see as resistance to invasion, defense of Islam foreign aggression and an acute sense of injustice. and action against injustice perpetrated by those in power. An empathic perspective can throw light on these factors. An empathic approach points to other factors that have Simply put, a small but significant number of Afghans influenced Afghans’ decisions to fight and which are mistakenly perceived U.S. forces as invaders who apparent in field research.12 For those who were threatened their safety and their country’s sovereignty, unemployed and destitute, the insurgency offered status, a religion or way of life. This perception was formed over sense of purpose and an “honorable” way for them to feed years of coalition airstrikes, ground assaults or night raids, their families; while for those educated in hard-line which caused large numbers of civilian deaths and injuries. madrassas, the jihad was a religious duty. Many have been Between 2007 and 2010 alone, the coalition and Afghan drawn into the insurgency through ties to a particular forces caused 2,500 civilian deaths, including hundreds of group of fighters, known as a Mahaz, typically led by a women and girls.10 Yet, the perpetrators, whether NATO prominent Taliban figure, or through the efforts of a forces or their Afghan allies, were seen as having impunity, community, tribe or faction to resist government predation and redress was seen as piecemeal and inadequate. Too or gain the upper hand in a local conflict or feud. Some are often, operations destroyed or damaged property, and motivated by personal ambition or criminal opportunism; house searches or even routine encounters were seen as others are driven by grievances, such as the persecution of aggressive and intrusive. It is therefore not surprising that Talibs after the 2001 intervention; and many have merely some Afghans came to disbelieve U.S. leaders when they sought to protect themselves and their families by siding said they sought to bring peace and stability to Afghanistan with those whom they expect to win. – even Afghan political leaders share this distrust. Nor is it surprising that Afghans who lost family members, friends Recognizing these factors does not in any way amount or neighbors joined the insurgency out of anger, for either to endorsing or justifying the Taliban insurgency. It retribution or to resist perceived aggressors. In this way, the is understanding, not approval. Who, in their right mind, U.S. presence galvanized resistance. could approve of the Taliban’s indiscriminate roadside and suicide attacks, or their systematic killing of civilians who The perception of U.S. aggression, which was evident from support the Afghan government? But knowledge of Taliban this author’s interactions with Taliban fighters and motivations is the kind of information that is crucial for commanders between 2009 and 2012, is easier to decision-makers. Indeed, by the mid-2000s, the entire war- appreciate if one considers the powerful historical, cultural fighting and state-building strategy rested on the premise and social factors that have influenced Afghan that the Taliban posed a threat to the West. This, in turn, perspectives.11 Not least, Afghans have misgivings about rested on a conception of the Taliban as extremists who foreign troops rooted in their country’s colonial and Soviet were intrinsically hostile and therefore aligned with al experiences, and many are influenced by nationalist or Qaida. An appreciation of Taliban motivations calls this fundamentalist sentiment as espoused by religious, central assumption into question. community or tribal leaders. A sense of foreign invasion – as a minority of Afghans saw it – was reinforced by the An in-depth, empathic understanding of the Taliban would massive western presence, and the outright corruption, also have helped U.S. leaders make a better judgment about predation and abuse of power by warlords and strongmen the efficacy of a strategy that was based on the assumption widely despised by Afghans but propped up by NATO. And that the Taliban could be defeated through attrition. In the mid-2000s the Taliban was generally estimated to have

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10,000-20,000 fighters.13 Despite massive losses, the between the parties, and undermined the position of movement is now believed to have up to 60,000 core moderate or pragmatic Taliban leaders who favored talks. fighters; it launched more than twice as many attacks in Compounding this, President Obama had already declared 2012, after the U.S. surge, than it did in 2008.14 The that the U.S. troops would start to withdraw in 2011, Taliban’s extraordinary resilience rested on the powerful undercutting insurgent incentives for talks. There is no misperception of invasion and the web of motivating certainty that talks would have succeeded, but the U.S. had factors described above, which enabled the movement to two major sources of negotiating leverage: the presence of expand its overall strength in spite of heavy attrition. An U.S. troops that the Taliban had vowed to expel, and the earlier appreciation of these factors might also have pointed Taliban’s craving for international recognition. In sum, to the potential for a negotiated outcome – something that misunderstanding the Taliban meant that a course by was opposed by most U.S. decision-makers until 2011. which the U.S. might have mitigated the threat from al Indeed, an empathic approach helps to explain why a Qaeda and avoided countless deaths and enormous costs, significant number of Taliban leaders were, and still are, was never seriously explored until the odds were stacked interested in talks. against it. As James Dobbins, the U.S. Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, said in In particular, for several years Taliban leaders have been November 2013, if reconciliation, among other things, had under pressure from Afghan communities to desist from been pursued earlier, “I think the insurgency would either fighting, and pressure from within the movement’s own have been avoided or attenuated and clearly many lives – ranks to reduce losses and deliver results. They have long Afghan as well as allied – would have been saved.”16 resented living in exile and being manipulated by Pakistan’s military intelligence agency, Inter-Services Misjudging our "ally" Intelligence (ISI). Taliban leaders are concerned about the potential re-emergence of an anti-Taliban coalition backed The United States also seriously misread Pakistan’s by regional powers, as happened in 2001. They know that military, especially the ISI, which has long provided since the 1990s the expectations of ordinary Afghans have sanctuary and support to the Afghan Taliban. Indeed, changed: Afghan citizens expect decent public services, Pakistan houses the engine-room of the Afghan which the Taliban cannot deliver. Moreover, many Taliban insurgency. From Pakistan, the Taliban leadership plans leaders want international recognition; they fear once again and directs operations in Afghanistan, it oversees the becoming a global pariah, recognized by only a handful of acquisition and transfer of munitions, manages logistical countries and dependent on Pakistan, as they were in the bases, runs training camps, and organizes fundraising and 1990s. Paradoxically, they want recognition from the West, recruiting. For years, U.S. decision-makers believed they and the perceived security and political benefits that could persuade, incentivize or coerce Pakistan’s military accompany such recognition. leaders into taking steps to restrain Afghan insurgents. This helps to explain why the United States has provided Under powerful misapprehensions of the Taliban, U.S. $27 billion of assistance to Pakistan since 2001.17 But decision-makers missed these perspectives and discounted Pakistan’s support to the Taliban was a non-negotiable the possibility of negotiations until late 2010, when the first insurance policy. Some U.S. officials, taking an empathic high level U.S.-Taliban dialogue took place – some nine approach, came to realize this by the late 2000s. As the years after the initial intervention.15 By that time, the U.S. U.S. Ambassador in Islamabad, Ann Patterson, said in a had launched a military surge, seen by insurgents as a leaked cable of September 2009: “There is no chance that declaration of war, which generated a gulf of mistrust Pakistan will view enhanced assistance levels in any field as

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sufficient compensation for abandoning support to these and growing threat from Islamic militants it had once groups [the Taliban and others], which it sees as an nurtured, who coalesced as the Pakistani Taliban in 2007. important part of its national security apparatus against Since 2003, these groups have reportedly killed over 5,000 India.” Pakistani police and soldiers and some 18,000 civilians.18 There was simply no real prospect of Pakistani military leaders confronting the Afghan Taliban, which constituted, If U.S. officials had come to appreciate this in their eyes, an essential geostrategic tool. perspective sooner, they might have realized If U.S. officials had come to appreciate this perspective that even with a military surge the United sooner, they might have realized that even with a military States was unlikely to be able to defeat an surge the United States was unlikely to be able to defeat an enemy that was not only strongly motivated, but which, due enemy that was not only strongly motivated, to the mindset of Pakistani officials, had access to but which, due to the mindset of Pakistani neighboring sanctuaries, and a vast and secure operational infrastructure. They would also have realized the critical officials, had access to neighboring importance of Pakistan in brokering political reconciliation sanctuaries, and a vast and secure operational with the Taliban. It is widely agreed that no peace process can succeed without Pakistan’s support, and yet, even infrastructure. today, it is kept at arm's length from the process.

It is not only the Taliban and Pakistan’s military that the A more systematic empathic approach might have U.S. misread. Its understanding of the Afghan government penetrated the Pakistani mindset at an earlier stage of the – once seen as its principal ally – was sorely deficient, as conflict. It would have discerned that Pakistan’s military underscored by the troubled U.S.-Afghanistan relationship, leaders were preoccupied with, even paranoid about the and the role of government predation and misgovernance perceived threat from India, rooted in the dispute over in undercutting coalition counter-insurgency goals. Given Kashmir and a succession of military clashes, including the the obvious importance of understanding key adversaries 1971 India-Pakistan war, which led to the secession of East and “allies,” what explains the failure of the United States Pakistan, now Bangladesh. Accounting for over half the to get inside their minds? The answer lies in organizational population of Pakistan as it was then, this colossal loss was and attitudinal factors that act as constraints to empathy, a source, not only of humiliation, but also of enduring which are considered respectively. existential anxiety. In the eyes of Pakistan’s military leaders, the possibility of a strong, Indian-allied government in Constraints to empathy Afghanistan – Pakistan’s north-west flank – was an unacceptable threat to Pakistan’s national security. This was Effective empathy depends upon a minimal level of compounded by several factors: India’s growing political knowledge of the actors under consideration. But U.S. State and economic presence in Afghanistan; reports of Indian Department personnel rules that favor generalists meant support to Baloch separatist insurgents in Pakistan; that even a decade after 2001 the U.S. lacked Afghanistan Afghanistan’s unwillingness to recognize the Durand line; specialists. At the height of the surge in early 2011, the U.S. and Afghan irredentist claims for Pashtun areas of had 100,000 troops in Afghanistan and just six Pashto Pakistan, which hosts twice as many Pashtuns as speaking Foreign Service officers in the whole region.19 Afghanistan. Furthermore, Pakistan was facing a serious

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Frequent rotations of U.S. diplomats – 90 per cent of the purposes. The C.I.A.’s “Red Cell,” a diverse team tasked Kabul embassy staff leave annually – has created enormous with challenging conventional thinking and anticipating discontinuity and even further inhibited the accumulation future security threats, may also, in some cases, use an of expertise.20 This has also prevented the formation of empathic approach. But this is not established policy, and genuine, lasting relationships with Afghan nationals that understanding adversaries is only one aspect of the group’s are crucial to achieve a high level of understanding. Risk work. On the whole, empathy is not only neglected but aversion means that U.S. diplomats have generally been actively avoided by U.S. officials. There appear to be six confined to fortified compounds, rarely meeting with main reasons for this eschewal of empathy, none of which Afghans; those they have met usually echo their thinking. is convincing. Security risks are real and must be managed, but the success of the mission may depend as much on calculated First, there is a concern that attempting to see another’s risk-taking by diplomats as by American soldiers, many of perspective will attenuate U.S. officials’ conviction in, or whom have risked their lives on a daily basis. commitment to, any given national cause, or even that they will “go native.” But such misgivings need to be weighed Ideally, intelligence work should provide a nuanced, against the significant potential benefits; moreover, the accurate picture of adversaries and allies. But coalition attempt to empathize need only be undertaken by a limited intelligence gathering in Afghanistan has been driven by number of officials. Second, empathy, in general usage, has operational imperatives, such as force protection or been mistakenly conflated with sympathy, and in some offensive action. As Michael Hayden, a former U.S. Central disciplines it has been used to mean a sharing of another’s Intelligence Agency (C.I.A.) director, has said: “A lot of feelings. This need not be the case: empathy as practiced by things that pass for analysis right now is really targeting.”21 a government can be considered as an analytical tool that Indeed, in Afghanistan the C.I.A. has run several powerful does not require any kind of isomorphism or the sharing of paramilitary militias, and directed drone strikes in the feelings. And it can be used to comprehend another’s state border areas. The consequence, in the words of another of being – not only another’s emotions but also their American intelligence official, Major General Michael mindset and perspective. Third, empathy is seen as vague. Flynn, is that “U.S. intelligence officers and analysts can do True, it is difficult to empathize with a high level of little but shrug in response to high level decision-makers accuracy, especially given cultural barriers, ambiguous seeking the knowledge, analysis, and information they information, and changing circumstances. There is also need.”22 immense variability within any one actor or group. But much diplomatic and intelligence work faces similar Another powerful reason why U.S. officials have often problems and is necessarily imprecise. That does not mean failed to get inside others’ minds is because they have had it is without value. In reading the theater of war, military no intention of empathizing with them. Empathy requires a leaders tend to prefer numbers over nuance (witness the cognitive shift: simulating or imagining another’s proliferation of “metrics” on Afghanistan); but there can be experience, mindset and perspective. The best diplomats, false comfort in quantifiables. Measurability does not spies and politicians empathize instinctively: it underpins equate to utility. As indicated above, judgments about how their ability to interpret, anticipate or influence others. But an adversary thinks, feels or perceives are often essential for this is rarely acknowledged, and it is therefore practiced strategy-making. unsystematically. To a point, military “red-teaming” (war role-playing) draws on an empathic approach, but it focuses Fourth, empathy, mischaracterized as purely a sentimental on identifying vulnerabilities and is largely for operational impulse, has been marginalized by theoretical and practical

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approaches to foreign policy that are dominated by such as operational goals. While understandable, this assumptions about the rational pursuit of power and self- approach can lead to the neglect of certain factors, which interest. The cases of the Afghan Taliban and Pakistan’s may seem inconsequential, but which have an enormous, military, considered above, suggest that a complex web of cumulative impact on another’s way of thinking. In rational and non-rational factors help to explain others’ Afghanistan, for example, conceptions of national identity behavior. Empathy is an effective means of discerning those influenced by historic struggles against outsiders or factors. Fifth, empathy is avoided because it yields insights predilections for conspiracies about foreign involvement that often conflict with an actor’s self-image. In may seem, to outside observers, as comparatively Afghanistan, U.S. officials generally saw their efforts as insignificant, but they had major implications for counter- advancing freedom and promoting stability; yet, as insurgency efforts. discussed above, some Afghans saw Americans as invaders. Naturally, it is hard to accept others’ conceptions of us But empathy’s unique quality is that it requires a change of when they contradict or call into question our own self- perspective, and because how something is seen and image, but this cannot justify ignoring such beliefs, interpreted depends on the eyes through which it is seen, especially if they motivate armed resistance. Sixth, this shift of perspective can enhance understanding, even America’s military supremacy and its strategic culture, with the same information at hand. Moreover, the practice which elevates the efficacy of force, appears to have led to of empathizing helps to mitigate certain sentiments or the conception that the U.S. doesn’t need to understand biases that distort the way decision-makers process others. The cost, death toll and legacy of American information, and which are especially prevalent in war- interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq strongly suggest time. In particular, there is a tendency for officials to over- otherwise. simplify the conflict, see it in Manichean terms and demonize the enemy, propensities that are compounded by The value of empathy propaganda for war-fighting, institutional or political ends. There is a tendency to assume that all actors opposing the Even if these organizational and attitudinal obstacles can be enemy must be allies. And, as noted, officials are especially overcome, why should empathy yield any greater insights bad at appreciating how they themselves are seen by others. than simply acquiring reliable information, applying logic In fact, due to a tendency known as “attribution error,” or common sense, and drawing informed inferences? It decision-makers often attribute an adversary’s behavior to may not and empathy is certainly no panacea. It should be intrinsic hostility rather than to situational factors, and considered as an additional tool rather than a substitute for typically underestimate their own role in provoking the conventional methods. However, the characteristics of adversary’s response. Taking another’s perspective can help empathy mean it is well suited to render insights about them appreciate that their own actions, which they regard other actors. as evidently taken in self-defense or in the collective interest, can be seen by others as acts of aggression. All of Empathizing forces the empathizer to assimilate, these tendencies were evident in U.S. conceptions of the holistically, the widest possible range of relevant conflict in Afghanistan, and each had major consequences information – including social, cultural, historical and for policy-making. Empathy is uniquely suited to help psychological data – in order to simulate another’s way of officials cut through these cognitive distortions and acquire thinking and perspective. Conventional intelligence or a deeper, more objective understanding of other actors. analytical work is often more targeted, focusing on prominent issues or concerns that reflect western priorities,

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In Ukraine, as John Mearsheimer has pointed out, the Empathy’s unique quality is that it requires a United States failed to anticipate Russia’s recent change of perspective, and because how intervention because “few American policymakers are capable of putting themselves in Mr. Putin’s shoes.”24 Had something is seen and interpreted depends they done so, they would have realized that Russian leaders on the eyes through which it is seen, this shift would see President Yanukovych’s removal and the establishment of a pro-western government as a direct of perspective can enhance understanding, threat to Russia’s core strategic interests. Consider the even with the same information at hand. background to the crisis, especially the eastwards expansion of NATO, which Russia sees as a hostile alliance, along with the bloc’s 2008 announcement that Ukraine “will The case of Afghanistan underscores the potential value of become” a member of NATO.25 For Russian leaders, cognitive empathy. Admittedly, insights derived from colored by a Cold War mindset, the emergence of a empathy might not have outweighed the U.S. military’s government in Kiev aligned with the West and partnered by faith in counter-insurgency, or President Obama’s domestic the European Union was not just an encroachment on their political calculations. But empathy could have made the legitimate sphere of influence but a national security threat U.S. aware of the likely resilience of the Taliban and the that demanded a forceful response. intransigence of Pakistan’s ISI, each of which rendered U.S. strategic goals profoundly unrealistic. It might have What should be done? led to earlier consideration of the potential for negotiations with the Taliban, and equipped U.S. officials with the Given this neglect of empathy, what should be done about knowledge to help such talks succeed. Moreover, empathy it? Initially, the United States should acknowledge the might have helped the United States avoid a costly, arduous potential utility of empathy and seek to develop the and ultimately unsuccessful counter-insurgency campaign. empathic analytical skills of certain, high-level diplomatic, intelligence and military officials. In doing so, it should But is Afghanistan an isolated case of U.S. failure to draw on extensive insights about the practice of empathy empathize?23 A brief consideration of two very different from social and political psychology, the body of work on cases, Iran and Ukraine, suggests not. American officials empathic accuracy, and possibly even neuroscience, which have long seen Iran as driven by ideological fanaticism and is uncovering the mental processes behind empathy. It implacably hostile to the United States. In reality, Iran’s should establish high-level mechanisms to enable U.S. policies have been driven largely by what they see as officials to step outside conventional thinking, so often American-Israeli hostility, and regional threats and shaped by a prevailing institutional narrative, and ensure rivalries. Despite hardline elements, the Iranian leadership that empathic insights are taken into account in the foreign- is often rational and pragmatic, as indicated by its recent policy decision-making process. The U.S. should make at nuclear rapprochement with the West. Yet the U.S. least five further institutional or policy changes which misconception of Iran has had major consequences: it would enhance its ability to empathize with and understand underpinned confrontational policies that caused Iran to others. give significant support to U.S. adversaries in Iraq, Afghanistan and now Syria. First, steps should be taken to develop long-term cadres of regional and country experts in State Department and other relevant agencies; personnel rules should be changed to

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ensure that generalists are not favored over specialists. Second, tours of duty should be extended, or repeat tours Research Service, 4 March 2014), pp. 42 and 57. encouraged, language training enhanced, and movement 4 See: http://www.defense.gov/news/casualty.pdf. constraints reduced to enable U.S. officials to travel widely 5 Robert Gates, Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War (New and to forge relationships with a range of individuals over York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2014), p 589. sustained periods. Third, the U.S. should overcome its 6 Robert Jervis, “Leadership, Post-Cold War Politics, and reluctance to meet with the enemy. As U.S.-Taliban talks Psychology,” Political Psychology indicate, this does not amount to conferring legitimacy on 15(4), 1994, 769–777, p. 771. an adversary. Instead, talks can be strategically prudent and 7 Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn, “Separating the yield useful information about an adversary, put them Taliban from al-Qaeda,” (New York: Center for International under pressure or give momentum to moderates. Fourth, Cooperation, Feb. 2011). efforts should be made to ensure that information 8See: gathering and intelligence work is not unduly distorted by http://www.un.org/sc/committees/1267/aq_sanctions_list.shtm operational imperatives, or, indeed, subjected to political l. pressures. Mechanisms should be established to monitor 9 E.g. Rob Taylor, “U.S. General says al Qaeda just surviving and curtail any such trends. Fifth, in making assessments in Afghanistan,” Reuters, 26 July 2013. of other actors, concerted efforts should be made to draw 10 on a wider range of sources of information, especially U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, “Annual Reports independent field research and academic studies of the on the Protection of Civilians.” 11 culture, sociology and history of a country or region. Matt Waldman, “Dangerous liaisons with the Afghan Taliban: the feasibility and risks of negotiations” In enhancing understanding, empathy cannot prescribe (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 2010). 12 policies – but it can help ensure U.S. foreign policies are For example: Sarah Ludbury and Cooperation for Peace and made on a more informed basis. Crucially, empathy can Unity, “Testing hypotheses on radicalisation in Afghanistan” provide insights into how other actors are likely to perceive (Kabul, 2009). 13 and react to what the United States does, and expose false “Afghanistan’s Taliban: War without end,” The Economist, assumptions that sometimes underpin strategic mistakes. 25 October 2007. 14 This kind of information is critical as the United States “Trends through August 2012 and Trends through weighs options for action – coercive or otherwise – in Syria, December 2012” (Kabul: ISAF, 24 September 2012 and 22 Ukraine and beyond. The case of Afghanistan shows that January 2013). Antonio Giustozzi, “Taliban networks in the human, financial and geo-political costs are too high for Afghanistan” (Newport, RI: U.S. Naval War College, 2012). 15 empathy to be ignored. Ahmed Rashid, Pakistan on the brink: the future of America, Pakistan and Afghanistan (New York: Viking, 2012), pp. 113- 1 “Afghanistan Annual Report on the Protection of Civilians in 116. 16 Armed Conflict: 2013,” (Kabul: U.N. Assistance Mission in Damien McElroy, “US let Taliban come back from defeat,” Afghanistan, Feb 2014), pp. 1 and 12. says top envoy, The Telegraph, 1 November 2013. 17 2 Emma Graham-Harrison, “Afghan forces suffering too many “Direct Overt U.S. Aid Appropriations for and Military casualties, says top Nato commander,” The Guardian, 2 Reimbursements to Pakistan, FY2002-FY2015,” (Washington, September 2013. DC: Congressional Research Service, 26 March 2014). See: 3 Kenneth Katzman, “Afghanistan: post-Taliban governance, http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/pakaid.pdf. security, and US policy,” (Washington, D.C.: Congressional

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18 Anatol Lieven, “Pakistan: the mess we can’t ignore,” The 22 Michael Flynn, Matt Pottinger and Paul Batchelor, “Fixing New York Review of Books, 20 March 2014. intel: a blueprint for making intelligence relevant in 19 “Inspection of the Office of the United States Special Afghanistan,” (Washington DC: Center for New American Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan,” (Washington, Security, 2010). DC: Inspector General of the U.S. Department of State, June 23 It is likely that many other states fail to empathize. Ralph 2011) p 21. White cites various historical examples in “Empathy as an 20 “Additional Steps Needed to Address Continuing Staffing intelligence tool,” International Journal of Intelligence and and Experience Gaps at Hardship Posts,” (Washington, DC: Counter Intelligence 1, No 1 (1986), pp. 57-75. However, this Government Accountability Office, 2009), p. 22, and Rajiv article addresses the problem in the United States. Chandrasekaran, Little America: the war within the war for 24 John Mearsheimer, “Getting Ukraine Wrong,” The New Afghanistan (New York: Knopf, 2012) p. 179. York Times, 13 March 2014. 21 Mark Mazzetti, “C.I.A. to Focus More on Spying, a 25 “Joint Statement – Meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Difficult Shift,” The New York Times, 23 May 2013. Commission at the level of Heads of State and Government,” NATO, 4 April 2008.

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